Woman Sues Google Over Street View Shots of Her Underwear 417
Kittenman writes "The Telegraph (and several US locals) are covering a story about a Japanese woman who had her underwear on the line while the Google car went past. She is now suing Google: 'I was overwhelmed with anxiety that I might be the target of a sex crime,' the woman told a district court. 'It caused me to lose my job and I had to change my residence.'"
Common sense says... (Score:5, Insightful)
Expectation of Privacy (Score:3, Insightful)
Mental Illness (Score:5, Insightful)
'I was overwhelmed with anxiety that I might be the target of a sex crime,' the woman told a district court. 'It caused me to lose my job and I had to change my residence.'
Even ignoring the fact that the woman's underwear was apparently visible from the street in the first place and it never bothered her. This reeks of unhealthy paranoia to me, is Google really responsible for one woman's mental issues? Granted, this thinking is exactly what the modern media creates, the idea that the world is filled with kidnappers, rapists, and violence. It's ironic that there are fewer murders than ever in US history, the kidnapping rate is lower than it was in 1940, and the overall violent crime rate sets new record lows every year (maybe not since the recession, but I haven't heard).
Re:Expectation of Privacy (Score:4, Insightful)
How would that even work? No. I think trying to somehow distinguish between regular public and internet public is kind of dumb. Here's a good rule of thumb. Live your public life as though everything you do will end up on the internet.
More like overwhelmed with anxiety (Score:5, Insightful)
... that she might miss out on a chance to sue a big company for a whole lot of money she doesn't deserve, by feigning distress. I'm sure nobody involved thinks it's anything other than BS, but they're probably hoping Google will settle.
Re:Expectation of Privacy (Score:5, Insightful)
There's "private". Then there's "public". But then there's "on the Internet", which is a whole different ball of wax.
No, it isn't. "On the Internet" is where you should assume everything "public" will end up. Or put another way, you should always assune the whole world is watching anything you do in public. This was a good idea before the Internet, and it's a better idea now.
Re:Expectation of Privacy (Score:4, Insightful)
There's "private". Then there's "public". But then there's "on the Internet", which is a whole different ball of wax.
Not for long. Get used to it... I don’t see the trend changing.
Re:Common sense says... (Score:0, Insightful)
Common sense says there's no need for a company to go around the world ignoring local rules, laws or even society conventions, taking pictures to put online, with the pure motive of selling more adverts.
Re:Common sense says... (Score:5, Insightful)
Common sense says taking a picture from a publically accessable location is fair game. After that the rest of your argument falls apart.
Re:So? (Score:4, Insightful)
If you have to add a bunch of text to get around the lameness filter, maybe you should reconsider posting your lame post.
Time to play Devil's Advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
This woman is making at least one claim that can be tested - that she lost her job due to this. It would be rather simple to find out if this was the case - ask her ex-boss if he fired her over them, find out if she was shunned by coworkers over the images, etc. Most cases of people suing over trivialities involve less testable claims. As such, either she's not good at trolling the legal system, or she's got more of a case than we've assumed. After all, Japan is a much different culture than America or Europe - something like this could actually be a big deal over there. I honestly don't know. So, I'm going to wait for more info before making any sort of final judgement.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Common sense says... (Score:4, Insightful)
Japan is where there are huge problems with men groping teenage girls on the train, to the point where there are "women only" cars now. And you're telling us that nobody in Japan would dare look at this woman's panties drying on a line?
Re:Common sense says... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Common sense says... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not a corner case. Many localities have differing regulations concerning photography. You think all laws are sensible? FFS, there are places where there are still laws on the books prohibiting you from putting squirrels in your pants for the purposes of betting. If you think the law is about "common sense" you may be in for a rude shock when you travel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Photography_and_the_law [wikipedia.org]